Fright lovers will find plenty of “haunted houses” across the state this Halloween season.

But Ohio harbors a number of sites where real ghosts are alleged to dwell year-round, including
a few well-known inns.

Travelers can spend the night in some of these supposedly haunted houses if they dare. Here are
tales from three.

Shadowy trio

Ohio’s oldest inn, the Golden Lamb in Lebanon, is reputed to have at least three ghosts in
residence. The ghosts usually appear in the guest rooms or connecting hallways of the four-story
brick Colonial-style inn.

The specter most often reported is a figure of a small girl who has been associated with Sarah
Stubbs, the daughter of an early owner. Sarah, however, lived to a ripe old age, so her inner child
must be doing the haunting.

Two other purported ghosts each played an interesting role in Ohio history.

One is said to be the spirit of Charles Sherman, the father of future Civil War Gen. William
Tecumseh Sherman.

At the time of his death, the elder Sherman was an Ohio Supreme Court justice, a well-respected
jurist whose legal opinions were favorably cited by scholars decades later.

Sherman, a cigar smoker, was staying at the inn during a court session in Lebanon when he died
of a sudden illness, leaving behind his wife, 9-year-old William and 10 other children age 18 and
younger.

The alleged spectral appearance of his bewhiskered visage is often accompanied by the smell of
cigar smoke in the smoke-free hotel. Perhaps the ghost is unsettled because he left his family
penniless.

He could have rested easy, though. Friends helped raise the children, many of whom became
successful political, military and business leaders.

The other ghost was a more controversial figure: Clement Vallandigham, a U.S. congressman who
opposed the Civil War.

He was running for governor of Ohio when he was expelled from the North by the federal
government because of his anti-war views and speeches.

Vallandigham returned to Ohio after the war and practiced law. He was staying at the Golden Lamb
while defending a client on murder charges.

The lawyer planned a demonstration in court to prove the victim had actually shot himself. But
during practice, Vallandigham accidentally shot himself in the abdomen.

You’ve heard of being so embarrassed that you could die? Vallandigham did, the next morning.

And now he is, perhaps, a permanent guest.

For more information on the Golden Lamb Inn, call 513-932-5065 or visit
www.goldenlamb.com.

Paranormal politician

Politics might play a role in the hauntings at the Colonel Taylor Inn in Cambridge, too.

The magnificent 9,000-square-foot Victorian mansion was built by local banker, publisher and
politician Joseph D. Taylor. Taylor, who served in Congress, was friends with U.S. presidents and
Ohioans Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield and William McKinley — all of whom reportedly were
houseguests at the mansion at one time or another.

And perhaps still are.

In truth, the strange noises, unexplained footsteps and sudden smell of pipe tobacco that guests
sometimes encounter are usually attributed to the ghost of the pipe-smoking Taylor. (After all,
dead presidents have the White House to haunt.)

Ghosts or not, the inn has been voted best in the country by the readers of
Arrington’s Inn Traveler magazine — which would seem to be a good reason to stay there,
even after you’re dead.

Daughter dearest

The lovely 1861 Inn in Batavia, built during the Civil War, is allegedly haunted by a longtime
resident and the daughter of the original owner, whose ghost some guests claim to have seen or
heard roaming the halls.

Jennie Penn etched her name in one of the house’s original thick glass panes, but that isn’t the
only (physical) evidence of Jennie that remains.

The innkeepers have many original Penn family mementos on display, including Jennie’s 1885
Batavia High School graduation announcement.

Jennie never married and never moved away, occupying the house until her death in the 1940s.

But Jennie wasn’t entirely a homebody. Guests can also leaf through a scrapbook containing
black-and-white vacation snapshots that Jennie took during the 1920s or 1930s.

Jennie, who was an artist, can also be seen through a haunting self-portrait that hangs in the
inn’s dining room. So her ghost would certainly be easy to recognize.

Even if guests don’t
see Jennie’s spirit, they’ll feel evidence of it lingering in the house she called home
for so many decades.

For more information on the 1861 Inn, call 513-735-2466 or visit
www.1861inn.com.